Essay Extract: To what extent is it accurate to suggest that the Soviet Union was a Totalitarian Empire?

Just another extract from some of my on going work. Please feel free to comment.

It is important however to define what this essay regards as totalitarian (both in governance and as a debate), revisionist and empire. Also important is how the Soviet Union is related to these definitions, for example the Soviet Union’s known distance from any form of imperialistic values may be at ends with certain definitions of ‘empire’ so it is important to define this early on in the essay.  The Oxford English Dictionary defines empire as “an extensive group of states or countries ruled over by a single monarch, an oligarch, or a sovereign state” and in the mass noun “supreme political power over several countries when exercised by a single authority.” (Oxford English Dictionary) If the Soviet Union can be defined within this definition, it is possible to compare the USSR to other empires, for example, the Roman, British and Russian empire. The problem here is obvious, that the Soviet Union was created entirely in opposition to the values and ideas of these entities, in particular the Imperial Russian Empire. Therefore to avoid these obvious pitfalls this essay will try to define the Soviet Union as an empire within itself, and to avoid comparisons with other notably ‘Imperial’ regimes. However there will in some areas be comparisons with these imperial regimes, but this will in no way diminish the conclusion that the Soviet Union was a totalitarian empire. This essay will also define totalitarianism (as the form of governance, not the stance in the debate) as a “form of government falling into the general classification of dictatorship, a system in which technologically advanced instruments of political power are wielded without restraint by centralised leadership/ for the purpose of affecting a total social revolution/ conditioning of man on/ ideological assumptions, proclaimed by the leadership in an atmosphere of coerced unanimity of the entire population.”  (Linz: 2000, pg 66)

             

This essay will identify that the largest comparison between the Soviet Union and other empires, is in how it deals with the problems of nationalities. How the Soviet Union dealt with the nationalities issue will provide evidence of an empire nature within the distinctly totalitarian Soviet Union. The issues surrounding the problem of nationalities should be addressed before the entering the totalitarian/ revisionist debate. This essay will first assert that the Soviet Union was indeed an empire, then latter develop upon why it was so totalitarian in nature. Therefore the first area that needs to be asserted is the Soviet Union’s imperial nature, in particular with regards to its nationalistic policies and its treatment of its ethic majorities and minorities. The issue of nationalities is something that every Empire throughout history at some point, had to address, and the Soviet Union was no different. From its early days of the Bolshevik revolution, to its eventual break up in 1991, the Soviet Union had taken a derisibly imperialistic approach to its nationality problem. “In the modern world empires collapse along national lines; the Soviet Union collapsed along national lines, therefore, the Soviet Union was an Empire.” (Martin: 2001, pg. 19) In the early days of the Soviet Union, Lenin was all too aware of the strength (and dangers) of unchecked national fever, undoubtedly influenced by the breakup of the Austro-Hungarian empire and observing the role played by the ethnic groups. Lenin and Stalin therefore where acutely aware of the danger of being labelled as imperialistic in an era where nationalism was so strong. “The Soviet Union became the first multi-ethnic state in world history to define itself as an anti-imperial state. They were not indifferent to the word “empire.” They rejected it explicitly.” (Martin: 20001, pg. 19) The main issue asserted was the difference between the ‘Core and Periphery’ of the Soviet Union, the totalitarian nature (as the nature of the communist party) of governance from the core, could all too easy be interpreted by the periphery (and internationally) as distinctly Imperial. “One of the main methodological precepts/ holds that the USSR was a direct continuation of the Russian empire, with a multi-ethnic formation dominated by a central ethnic group.” (Shlapentokh: 2001, pg 12) However by looking at the way the core (by the core I am referencing the leadership of the Soviet Party and the majority Russian/Slavic ethnics) dealt with this problem, we can identify a particularly totalitarian and ultimately imperial nature of the governing party. The early Bolshevik leadership in its totalitarian nature manipulated the Soviet Union so as to remove any concept of a powerful and distinctly Russian ethnic core, running a subjugated colonial periphery of independent ethnic groups. “To avoid this perception, the central state would not be identified as Russian. Russian national self-expression would be downplayed.” This is what Terry Martin discusses as the early Bolshevik strategy of an Affirmative Action Empire, which too an extent supports the revisionist debate.  The result of these policies saw a focus in the upward mobility of rural and lower class Bolshevik supporters, which benefited the periphery of the Soviet Union greatly, demonstrating that there was “bottom up” movement from within the party. “Soviet “affirmative action” policies/ by which upwardly mobile urban workers and peasants and their children were recruited into a new elite” (Fitzpatrick: 2007, pg 84) Indeed these upwardly mobilised groups would eventually take the places of many of those who falling to the purges in the 1930’s, creating and instating a whole new generation of distinctly socialist ‘intelligentsia’ within the Soviet elite, even surviving the reversion of this policy by Stalin. “In the early 1930’s at least half a million people of working class origin moved into white-collar and managerial jobs” (Christian: 1997, pg 312)

However Stalin orchestrated a complete reversion of this process by the late 1920’s, which demonstrates the weaknesses within the revisionist debate. Stalin very much believed that the key lay within survival and modernity of the state lay within the suppression of non-Russian nationalities. After securing widespread control in the centre, Stalin orchestrated a policy to “institutionalise a nationalities policy that was based on national assimilation. Officially only Russian nationalism was allowed to survive.” (Rezun: 1992: pg 5) Here we see the process of aggressive assimilation of nationalities within the Soviet Union that was to define Stalin’s reign and the beginnings of the Soviet Empire. Integral to this was the role of the purges and the ‘Great Terror’ of the 1930’s , which will be discussed in the next segment of this essay. Expressive control from the party leadership to preserve the Soviet Union through a system of rapid de-colonisation and imposing purist Russian nationalistic imperatives upon its widespread ethnic diaspora is distinctly totalitarian in nature. This thus supports to a great extent that it is accurate to describe the Soviet Union as a totalitarian empire.

Friedrich & Brzezinski outlined various key distinctions of a totalitarian system; this essay will utilise these as way points to demonstrate that the Soviet Union was distinctly totalitarian in nature. The combination of the six points will effectively support the observation of Shelia Fitzpatrick who summarises the totalitarians-model scholarship’s view of the Soviet Union as a ‘top-down entity’ (Fitzpatrick: 2007, pg 80). “The destruction of autonomous associations and the atomization of bonds between people produced a powerless, passive society that was purely an object of regime control and manipulation.” (Fitzpatrick: 2007, pg 80).

             

A major point to the substantiation of the totalitarian’s debate is the use of ideology by the communist party and its leaders; as an effective tool in mobilising, modernising and controlling the people of the Soviet Union. As outlined in Friedrich & Brzezinski first distinctions of a totalitarian system, “Official ideology, consisting of an official body of doctrine covering all vital aspects of man’s existence/ characteristically focused/toward a perfect final state of mankind.” (Friedrich & Brzezinski: 1965, pg 9) the role that ideology played in the initial development and continuation of the Soviet Union cannot be ignored and supports the totalitarians argument fully. “The Soviet dictatorship/ rests upon this belief in the instrumental nature of ideas and ideology” (Friedrich & Brzezinski: 1965, pg 73) As a result the  Soviet people were willing to fully accept anything that was phrased through the correct form within the ideology. The evolution in Soviet ideology often reflects what is happening within the USSR at that present time, for example during the time of collectivisation as part of a revolution within Soviet culture, and exhibits how ideology changed Soviet language and life. “Military metaphors invaded the language. The papers began to talk of ‘industrial fronts’/ and ‘traitors’/ the party projected its embattled and militaristic mood on the whole of Soviet society.” (Christian: 1997, pg 299) Control of the ideology of the state allowed for the government to utilise its power in a subversive way, it also strengthened the positions of the party elite and its leaders. By imposing censorships in line with party policy and ideology, the leadership where able stamp down dissidents within the system, “Trade unions lost their independence. Non-Marxists lost positions of influence/ censorship ended the broad-ranging debates.” (Christian: 1997, pg 298)